stefansson-wrangel-09-15-044-004

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misses so many times." She thinks native hunters would be better. She says
very little about Noice now, I think she doesn't understand why he didn't
answer her letter. She hasn't told me anything about dictating her story and
I haven't referred to it yet.

What I will do about that depends - certainly I must have
her confidence before she will talk freely. I don't believerher sliences
are all intentional - I think she has no idea of what would interest people
and cares less. She has no small talk - I think we American women might learn
something from her "thinking silences" - after she has been quiet for some
time she often breaks the silence by saying "I have been thinking..."
I asked her if she thought in English, but she said, "No, in Eskimo."

She told me about the death of her two children - and of
her father. How he was so sick from poison, "eating old meat then fresh meat
which makes his stomach sick." They were in Solomon (?) and they "put on
his skin boots and pants and his 'parkie' and wrapped him in skins, quite warm,
and put him on the sled. Her sister got the dogs and started to drive him to
Nome but he died on the way." She was eight (Ada) at that time.

This ship she likes better than the "Victoria" and if it
is not too much trouble she would like her meals in her cabin. She calls me
on the phone when the service is slow - to get them to bring ice water.
Bennett drinks gallons - and eats ice in chunks, likewise puts oceans of
salt and pepper on his bread.

He is cunning as can be and I like him. I think it is a
fine thing you in giving her this trip. She was quite sad today when she felt
too ill to get up and see the snow-covered mountains on the land - "I would like
to see some snow," she said. I asked about snow on Wrangell - "not much, for
the wind blows it away - in the ravines it might be deep - it packs hard.
Snowed heavily in August the first summer, but that was a cold year. Grass